I will never hide a thought from you; you shall be at once the
confidant and the dear object of my tenderness.

In what words--my Rivers, you rule every emotion of my heart;
dispose as you please of your Emily: yet, if you allow her to form a
wish in opposition to yours, indulge her in the transport of returning
you to your friends; let her receive you from the hands of a mother,
whose happiness you ought to prefer even to hers.

Why will you talk of the mediocrity of your fortune? have you not
enough for every real want? much less, with you, would make your Emily
blest: what have the trappings of life to do with happiness? 'tis only
sacrificing pride to love and filial tenderness; the worst of human
passions to the best.

I have a thousand things to say, but am forced to steal this moment
to write to you: we have some French ladies here, who are eternally
coming to my apartment.

They are at the door. Adieu!

Yours,
Emily Montague.

LETTER 138.

To the Earl of ----.

Silleri, May 12.

It were indeed, my Lord, to be wished that we had here schools, at
the expence of the public, to teach English to the rising generation:
nothing is a stronger tie of brotherhood and affection, a greater
cement of union, than speaking one common language.

The want of attention to this circumstance has, I am told, had the
worst effects possible in the province of New York, where the people,
especially at a distance from the capital, continuing to speak Dutch,
retain their affection for their ancient masters, and still look on
their English fellow subjects as strangers and intruders.

The Canadians are the more easily to be won to this, or whatever
else their own, or the general good requires, as their noblesse have
the strongest attachment to a court, and that favor is the great object
of their ambition: were English made by degrees the court language, it
would soon be universally spoke.

Of the three great springs of the human heart, interest, pleasure,
vanity, the last appears to me much the strongest in the Canadians; and
I am convinced the most forcible tie their noblesse have to France, is
their unwillingness to part with their croix de St. Louis: might not
therefore some order of the same kind be instituted for Canada, and
given to all who have the croix, on their sending back the ensigns
they now wear, which are inconsistent with their allegiance as British
subjects?

Might not such an order